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Linux 4.7 Shows How Far the Open-Source OS Has Come in 25 Years

Linux 4.7 Shows How Far the Open-Source OS Has Come in 25 Years

Linux is celebrating its silver anniversary at LinuxCon. Here's a look at how development of the Linux kernel has advanced since the open-source OS' debut 25 years ago.

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It All Started Aug. 25, 1991

On Aug. 25, 1991, Linus Torvalds publicly announced to the world that he was working on a new operating system, which in time would come to be known as Linux.

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A New Kernel Is Released Every 70 Days

The Linux kernel development release cycle over the course of the past year has ranged from 63 to 70 days.

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The Linux 4.7 Kernel Introduces 12,283 Changes

Even with the rapid release cycle of Linux, the volume of changes in each kernel remains high, with the Linux 4.7 release including 12,283 patches. The highest number of changes ever in a Linux kernel remains the Linux 3.15 release, which introduced 13,722 changes.

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7.8 Changes Are Added to the Linux Kernel Every Hour

Looking at the rate of change on a daily basis, 4,600 lines of code are added to Linux every day, with 7.8 patches (also known as change sets) merged every hour.

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There Are More Than 21 Million Lines of Code in Linux

With all that change in Linux and the rapid pace of development, the overall codebase is growing. In 1991, there were only 10,000 lines of code in Linux; today, Linux has 21,724,632 lines of code.

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More Than 1,500 Developers Contributed to Linux 4.7

The number of developers who contribute to any given Linux kernel release can vary over time. For the Linux 4.7 release, 1,582 developers contributed code.

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Intel Tops the List of Contribution Volume

More than 200 companies contribute to any given Linux kernel release. Looking at the 15-month development period between Linux 3.19 and Linux 4.7, Intel tops the list, with 12.9 percent of submitted changes, followed by Red Hat at 8 percent.

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Stable Updates Extend Linux Support Beyond Initial Release

Work on any given Linux kernel doesn't stop after the new kernel is released. Often there are many incremental updates to stable Linux kernels. For example, the Linux 4.6 kernel received 550 fixes in the time since it was first released.